


Please do shut up, Miss Stark

by sheepybaa



Series: Please do shut up, Miss Stark [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Female Tony Stark, Genderbend, I figured I should add the Bucky/Logan tag since everyone is going nuts for it, I'm Bad At Tagging, Oral Sex, Penis goes in vagina okay, Sex, Soulmates, Tony Being Tony
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-23
Updated: 2015-06-15
Packaged: 2018-03-25 10:08:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3806455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheepybaa/pseuds/sheepybaa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which your soulmate's first words to you appear somewhere on your body, and, predictably, Tony's big mouth gets her everywhere.  And by everywhere, she means Captain America.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the many soulmate-words AUs that I adore, combined with my second favorite trope, fem!Tony. If feedback is positive, I may add to this (jk I will almost definitely at least add Steve's POV). Enjoy!
> 
> If you're here for the Bucky/Logan-centric bits, you can skip to chapter four (though bits of Bucky's early experiences are also present in Steve's POV, which is chapter three).

_"Please do shut up, Miss Stark."_

Tony's words had been a cause for panic, when she was born. No multimillionaire wants their kid to have words that reek of violence--and kidnapping, to make it worse.

Howard had put about ten million round-the-clock guards on her, and gotten her self-defense training for good measure. Good old overprotective Daddy dearest.

Now, having successfully survived to see her 40s, Tony's been told to shut up more times than she can count. Developing a big mouth was probably a poor coping mechanism for her words, but she's also hot as fuck and has a black belt in six different martial arts, so.

Win some, lose some.

In Afghanistan, they told her to shut up plenty of times--but never that particular combo. That fact was a relief, and she clung to it, after. She might've had an arc reactor where her sternum should be, but at least she wasn't a terrorist's soulmate.

Becoming Iron Man put things into a bit more perspective. Apparently when you're a superhero, you get into even _more_ life-threatening situations than when you're just a billionaire. Many more situations where stealth (incidentally, not Tony's strong point) becomes important.

"Make a move, reindeer games," she says while motherfucking _Captain America_ bleeds all over the ground to the rear. What would SHIELD do without her?

Loki's smartly got his hands up, so she lets Natasha and SHIELD land their ship, handle things, and immediately attends to the very important task of panicking over the extremely fit and extremely wounded national icon at her six. As usual, her mouth is on autopilot.

"Oh dear sweet holy mother of God, that is a _lot_ of blood; I wish I had a fucking towel or some shit instead of all this metal, Jesus--uhh, here, I'll just--put some pressure on this, this delicious thigh of yours--holy shit I need to shut up--"

Captain America looks like he's about to crack more ribs than he already has, if he starts laughing, but instead he exercises some very manful control over himself, places his hand over hers on his now sluggishly bleeding thigh, and says: "Please do shut up, Miss Stark."

Tony can feel her jaw drop.

 _What_.

She takes a moment to lean back and eyeball him again (not that she wasn't ogling him in the suit, too, but cameras, even if they're _her_ cameras, can only convey so much).

Despite being sweaty, dirty, and bloody, with a couple gaping holes in his uniform, he looks utterly _edible_. His hair is tousled from the cowl, and the fabric of his suit looks like it's just been painted onto his absurdly well-muscled body. She smells a certain Agent's hand in that, which clearly deserves a high five next time she sees him. Tony just wants to rub herself all over his torso, then maybe suck his dick. Maybe just a little.

He's smiling at her, despite their being on the pavement with hundreds of frightened German civilians fleeing around them. Shit is on fire, some dude's eyeball has been violently removed, and Loki and his magic wand are being loaded onto the ship. Down the street, a car explodes.

Tony's always been creative, but. It's not the time or place.

So instead, she looks at Steve speculatively, and says, "Once this is wrapped up, I'm gonna suck your dick."

Steve's reaction is hilarious. He looks like Tony's just punched him in the gut, but in a positive way, if that makes sense. Tony doesn't really care if it does, because now that he's recovered his pretty blue eyes are going all dark and hooded and--that's a smirk. Captain America is _smirking_ at her. There's a pulse of heat low in her abdomen, and she feels a flood of moisture down near her lady parts. Tony swallows.

"Only if I get to return the favor," he returns, pulling her bloody hands off his quickly scabbing wound. Tony doesn't even give a shit.

"Oh, Steve," she purrs as he stands (and lifts her with him, armor and all, what a panty-dropper), "I think this is the beginning of a _beautiful_ relationship."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Tony keeps her word.

"To be honest, I didn't think I even had a soulmate," Steve admits to her later, after they get back to the (very destroyed, but with lower levels still inhabitable) tower. 

Tony nearly breaks her own neck turning to reply. "Seriously?" she says incredulously, eyebrows creeping into her hairline. She carries their drinks back to the couch where they've been lounging since the other Avengers cleared out and informs him, "I don't know what saint-like deeds I must have done in a past life to get paired with you here, because Fury can assure you, I am an annoying shit."

Steve laughs. "You know, I think he knew it was you," he tells her as she nestles into his side. He gives off heat like a furnace; it's amazing. 

"Well, to be fair, it's not hard to guess if you know me," Tony points out before taking a swig of her drink. "Swearing, serial talker, battle situation, mentions metal? You don't need two eyes to see that one coming."

Steve rolls _his_ eyes and rubs her waist where he's cuddling her--and, oh, _hello_ there, arousal; how nice to see you again. She can feel a tingle run down her spine as his long fingers smooth over the skin of her stomach; the thin t-shirt she threw on is riding up, and the tease of skin so close to skin is driving her nuts. 

Tony considers the profile of his face while he looks into the fireplace. She specifically brought him here because this is the best room in the tower for sex--besides, of course, her bedroom, but that can come later. Right now, she leans over to carefully, gently, set her drink on its coaster, and then slowly leans back, catching his attention. He's got an eyebrow raised, looking at her with a question in his eyes. God, he's so hot. 

"I believe," Tony says very deliberately, slipping her leg slowly over his, "that I still have a promise to fulfill."

Steve's caught on now, and he slides his hand over her thigh as she settles on his lap. "Oh? And what would that be?"

Tony can feel a mischievous smile creep across her cheeks as she watches his pupils dilate. Instead of replying, she says, "JARVIS, lock the door, please."

"Certainly, Miss," the AI says blandly. The lock clicks loudly in the silence of the room. Ah, J; he's like a long-suffering father whenever she pulls this shit. She'll have him delete the footage later, after she's watched it once or twice. 

In the meantime, she gets a handful of Cap's thick blonde hair and seals her mouth to his. He groans and arches his body to meet hers, and the hand on her leg slides back and up to settle just underneath her ass. His other hand mirrors it shortly, gripping her firmly while she moves her lips wetly against his, her tongue flicking out to slide against his sensuously. She slides her free hand up to join the other in his hair and clings to him tight. _Damn_ , but he's a good kisser. 

She can feel the pads of his fingers touching her inner thighs right below where her panties are soaking through her jeggings (don't judge; it's a legitimate fashion choice) and it makes her squirm, press down in his grip without thinking until she's grinding against his lap, making his hands clench and spasm, and _oh_ , hel- _lo_ , soldier. 

She grinds down against him again, just to feel the friction as he presses against her core before she pulls her mouth from his, tongue darting out to lick her lips. 

She pauses a moment to enjoy the view. 

He looks _wrecked_ , pupils blown so wide she can barely see the blue, hair all sex-tousled in her hands. His cheeks are flushed, mouth open and lips all pink and wet, and they look so delectable that Tony takes a second just to lean down and bite his lower lip. The way he chases her when she pulls away is oh so satisfying. 

He's about to say something, but before he does, Tony has business to attend to--and by business, she means Steve's dick. In her mouth. She slithers right out of his grip and down onto the floor in front of him, shoving his knees open as she goes. 

"Tony," he starts, voice low and wrecked but also clearly startled, "you don't have to--"

"Steve, let me share a secret with you," she says, cutting him off, and uses the distraction to slide her hands up his thighs. "I really, _really_ wanna suck your dick. I can already tell you're a ladies-first kind of guy, and don't get me wrong, normally I'd be on board with that--but if I don't get your dick in my mouth _yesterday_ , I'm going to be _very_ upset."

Throughout this speech, Steve has gone from looking dubious to looking dubiously reassured. He reaches down to brush her hair away from her face and says, "As long as what I said before still goes."

"As long as your boner is down my throat now, I literally do not care," Tony declares as she undoes his fly. Without any ceremony, she tugs him gently through the waistband of his boxer briefs and sucks him down. 

Steve gives this sort of strangled yell, his entire body drawing taut like a bowstring. His hands twitch in an aborted movement towards her head, and Tony takes the hand she's been using to grip his base and guides his hands into her hair, glancing up at him and trying to say _yes, it's okay, you can tug my hair, yes please_ as best she can with her mouth full. 

Tony used to have long hair, but after an unfortunate workshop incident she chopped it all off to pixie length. It was only afterwards that she discovered short hair's amazing side benefit: it allows for immediate, enthusiastic dick-sucking without stopping to grab a ponytail holder. 

As she takes more of Steve into her mouth, about three-fourths of the way down his nicely-sized erection (not too big, not too small), she reflects on this benefit and hums as his hands weave their way through the slight curl of her hair. He chokes a bit, then moans when she draws back to tongue at the head, licking at the slit and enjoying the salty taste she finds there before tightening her lips around his frenulum and sliding back down. With one hand, she cradles his balls, rolling them gently every so often, and with the other, she keeps him steady while she sucks. Once she's halfway, she flattens her hand and, drawing in a breath, opens up her throat and slides all the way down to the base. 

"Jesus Christ," Steve chokes out on a strangled moan, fingers spasming against her scalp. She nuzzles her nose against his pubic hair and hums contentedly, closing her eyes to just enjoy the feeling of him pressing on her tongue, in her throat, stretching her lips wide around his thick base. It's delicious, the feeling of heaviness and fullness in her mouth and throat, the way she can feel his pulse racing and his hands twitching. 

She's drawing back, and she's just about to try and get him to face-fuck her when he pulls her off abruptly, leaving a trail of spit down her chin. She makes a frustrated noise and chases his dick, then glares up at him with a prickle of annoyance. 

"What gives?" she asks with that distinct deep-throating crackle in her voice. His hands on her head are keeping her from getting back to business, and her fingers twitch where they've settled on his thighs out of respect for his wishes. 

"I don't want to finish yet," Steve says, and it's--it's _cute_ , the way he says finish instead of come, but that's completely counteracted by the heated look he's got on his face. Tony swallows, and his eyes flicker to the bob of her throat. She feels a flare of pride. 

"Wanna head to the bedroom?" she asks, eyes flickering towards the closed door. 

Steve's fervent reply of "Yes, please" is all she needs to tuck him gently back into his pants, zip him up, and lead the way into the hall, his hand clutching hers. 

"Hey, Stark, what gives?" Barton calls as they pass by the kitchen on the way to her room. Natasha and Bruce are sitting at the island with glasses of--something, Tony doesn't care, she's thinking with her vagina and _clearly_ not functioning on all cylinders. Clint continues, "The door to the bar was--"

"Fuck off, Barton," Tony snaps, the same time as Steve says, "It's open now."

They don't stick around to see the reactions; Tony has too much bed with too little Steve in it, which is remedied as soon as they're in her room with the lights dimmed. 

After shoving her man onto the bed like some wild, pornesque huntress, Tony strips them both faster than Steve clearly knows what to do with. She flings her bra and his shirt across the room while he laughs in disbelief, struggling to rip off his pants while he sits there and doesn't help at all. 

"Assist me," she demands, rearing back with his jean cuffs in her hands. She's down to her panties, of course, and she's managed to get Mr. Uncooperative's sticky denim down to his knees. With an indulgent smile, Steve reaches down to help her shuck off his pants, and with a triumphant cry, she flings them off into some dark corner. 

Suddenly, kneeling there on the end of the bed in just her VS cheekinis, joking all said and done... Tony feels very vulnerable. 

Steve is looking at her intently, and she's about to poke fun at him for staring when he reaches out and brushes his thumb along her words--his neat, old-fashioned handwriting that stretches across the top of her left breast. She shivers under the touch, and her nipples tighten. 

It's an effort to keep quiet while he intimately explores her skin, fingers brushing her waist, her stomach, the curve of her shoulder or wrist. By silent agreement, she steps out of her panties when he reaches her hips, and she would be annoyed with herself for not shaving recently if it weren't for the way his eyes go dark when he sees the small, curly patch of hair peeking out from between her legs. 

"You don't mind the hair?" She can't help but ask anyway, berating herself as soon as she does. It's not that she's embarrassed of her body, she got over that shit in college, but different guys have different preferences, and Tony's indifferent enough about it that she'll keep it whatever way he likes it. She's more curious than anything. 

Fortunately, Steve just glances up at her before one of the hands on her hips moves to brush through the top of the thin patch of curls, and she shivers. 

"I like it," he admits, tracing back and forth as if he can't help himself. "Couldn't tell you why. Maybe because you feel more, this way."

Tony murmurs agreement, but that's quickly choked off in favor of a breathless inhale when his hand dips lower, just brushing over her lips and the wetness that's been forming there for hours, now. She shivers and twitches when his fingers dance over her clit, and her hands shoot down to grasp his wrist. He glances up at her questioningly. 

"I think," she says, voice shaky, then swallows and says, a little steadier, "I think you should take off your underwear and lay on the bed."

"Good idea," he agrees, eyes meeting hers as he pulls his hand back and scoots up the covers, leaving her to crawl forward on her hands and knees to meet him. 

He takes off his underwear, and Tony--

Tony needs a moment. 

She sits back a little and just...takes him in. Miles and miles of beautiful golden skin, all the curves and planes of his well-toned body laid out on her sheets. His sex-ruffled hair, the line of his jaw, the thick curve of his dick and the happy trail that leads to it, everything lit up by the glow of the arc reactor in her chest. And it's all _Tony's_. 

"I get to have this," she reminds herself out loud. "I get to have this _forever_." The man before her is so perfect, it still seems absurd. 

Steve smiles, and reaches out with gentle hands. "Come here."

Tony goes, feeling strangely off-kilter, and lets him lower her down to the pillows before he looms above her, elbows bracketing her body on the bed. 

There's a moment where they just look at each other, and Tony glances away first, feeling shy for the first time in years. Steve's expression is soft as he leans in to kiss her, so sweet and slow that it's almost painful. She reaches up and touches his words, fingers smoothing over his bicep, and he shudders, pulling away. When he opens his eyes again, they've gone dark, and she knows before he moves that he's going to go down between her legs (pun intended). 

His eyes flicker up to meet hers, and she feels caught in his gaze as he lifts her legs over his wide shoulders, getting her all settled, then reaches up and around her hip to rub gently just above her clit. Tony's breath hitches, and she squirms, trying to move the friction lower, but he's got his other hand clamped firmly on her hip, so there's nothing she can do but lie there and take it. 

Without stilling his hand, Steve breaks eye contact to lower his head between her legs, hair falling until all she can see is his fingers circling, circling. She feels his breath puff against her before his lips touch her curls, and she groans as she feels his flat, dry tongue slide along the length of her folds, hears him swallow the moisture he gets and _god_ , that is hot. 

She feels rather than hears the rumble he gives. "Forgot how good that tastes," he tells her, and before she can comment he dives right back in. 

He gets particular pleasure out of teasing her entrance, she finds. He does that stupid circling thing with his fingers until she's practically sobbing with how much she wants him to just _touch_ her, already, whether it's her clit or inside her or _whatever_. 

Steve smiles up at her, shifting, and slides two fingers straight to home. 

Tony moans long and feels herself clench around his fingers. She arches her back and babbles, a nonsensical litany of "please" and "Steve" and " _pleasepleaseplease_." He curls his fingers up and rubs right up against her g-spot, making her twitch and mewl and nearly drool in his arms. While he's working away inside her, rubbing slow and torturous, he puts his mouth back to work and starts licking gentle circles around her clit. 

Tony shrieks, all incoherent noises at this point, and she can distantly feel her hands scrabble against the sheets while her arms spasm and flail uncontrollably. Her legs, especially, are twitching badly, and she worries that she might kick him in the head until he does this _thing_ with his tongue and the thought is swept away by the white noise of pleasure. 

"Steeeeve--St--Ste- _eeve_ ," she whines, huffing and panting, the muscles in her neck straining as he works her, steady and patient even as her thighs seize against his shoulders. He's murmuring encouragement, eyes fixed on her face, and with a shrieking moan that whistles out of her like a teakettle Tony slides over the apex and _comes_ , vision going white with the intensity of it, the incredible pleasure as her body twitches and spasms and her vocal chords are put totally beyond her control. 

She's still whistling, these little, breathy shrieks, when she comes down from it, writhing in his solid grip as he stares, smiling, up at her, fingers still working slowly inside her. She stares at him blindly beyond the low buzz of pleasure in her mind, then moans, "You're going to kill me," before she flops back, boneless, against the sheets. 

Steve laughs, moving up her body and planting kisses at he goes, before kissing her cheek. She makes a face and shoves a pillow at him. 

"Wipe your face after you eat, young man," she complains, turning away from his mouth and chin that still practically glisten with her wetness, and he rolls his eyes. 

"Yes, Ma," he replies, swabbing his face roughly before leaning in to kiss her again. This time, she obliges, meeting his lips sleepily at first, but as the minutes pass she feels more and more alert, stretching catlike against his body and returning the kiss enthusiastically. 

"I hope that's for me," she murmurs against his lips when she brushes his erection with her hips, and he huffs a laugh. 

"You _hope_ so?" he returns, one hand palming her breast. She grins and makes a gesture towards the bedside drawer. 

"Condoms?" she asks, quirking an eyebrow. "I'm on birth control, and I just got tested for STIs last month, so it's up to you."

Steve thinks for a moment. "I can't get sick," he admits, rubbing himself against her thigh languidly, "so...we can go without, I suppose."

"Long as you're comfortable," Tony replies simply, stretching when he thumbs her nipple. Safe sex is good sex, after all. She hums happily and turns over in his arms to press back against him, bracing herself against the sheets. 

"Why don't you just stick it in me, soldier?" she quips, eyes glittering at him over her shoulder, and she feels more than hears his breath hitch before his big hands grasp her hips and he yanks her back. She gasps and laughs delightedly, but that stutters to a stop when he folds himself over her back to say, voice husky and playful, "You asked for it."

He shifts behind her and her heart speeds up, anticipation building. She feels the tip of him brush against her as he lines himself up, and she moans, pressing back with her hips impatiently until he slides those first few inches in. Something inside her uncoils with the _rightness_ of it, and she groans unashamedly, dropping her head to press it against the pillows. 

"You feel so good," she mumbles into the sheets as he thrusts carefully in, pressing back to meet him until he's in all the way to the base, hips pressing up against her ass in the best way. 

" _Jesus_ , Tony," he groans, sounding wrecked, and she gasps as he thrusts, testing, shuddering as he bumps right against her g-spot. 

"That's a really, _really_ good angle," she slurs, feeling her body twitch again as he begins thrusting in earnest. "Shit, fuck, goddamn."

She reaches forward to brace herself against the headboard as his thrusts speed up, because it immediately becomes clear that if she doesn't, she's going to end up face-planting against it while he fucks her up the squeaking bed. The other thing that's rapidly becoming clear is that she's going to come a second time, from his dick alone. 

She feels and sees her limbs begin to twitch, and her vision starts to blur the longer he pounds against that particular spot, hammering home the pleasure over and over again. She realizes abruptly that those short, squeaky sounds she thought were the bed are _her_ , these little high, fucked-out noises he's forcing out of her on every thrust. She's laying almost completely flat on the bed now, her limbs having completely failed to bear her up against his strength. Luckily, he's taken it in stride, carefully cradling her as she folds under him, his big hands splayed warm against her stomach. 

When she comes the second time, it's with a squeak and a stiffening, and the same white vision as the first. It's a little shorter than the first one, this time, but that's only because as soon as she's coming out of it, he fucks her _straight into another orgasm_. God _damn_. 

When he comes, Tony's not coherent enough to be excited. He gives a final few thrusts and spills inside her with a groan, leaning over her and touching his forehead to her back as he comes. She has just enough energy left to reach back with a shaky hand and pet his head, fingers threading through his sweaty hair as he shudders. 

He collapses next to her, a little out of breath, and looks at her with an awed expression that pretty much conveys exactly how she feels right now. Tony smiles. Steve smiles back. There's a warm glow in her chest that isn't the arc reactor, a postcoital fuzziness that she thought everyone was making up. Looking at Steve, though, both of them basking in the glow of their first time together, she's pretty sure she knows what feeling they were talking about. 

"I have to go pee," Tony says, ruining the moment. Steve's laughter echoes after her as she wobbles to the bathroom on coltish legs to make sure she doesn't get a UTI. After she pees, drains as much come out of herself as possible (so that she doesn't have to do laundry tomorrow; she has nothing against jizz, itself), and washes her hands, she grabs a wet washcloth, stumbles back to the bed, and cleans off her soulmate's dick before patting it lovingly and collapsing into bed. 

"Uh, thanks," Steve says, sounding amused. 

"You're welcome," Tony mumbles, slinging an arm and a leg over his naked torso. "Pull the sheets up?"

Steve does, which is how Tony knows he's a keeper. 

 

 

Meanwhile, out in the kitchen, Clint holds out his hand triumphantly. 

"Pay up, losers." Two twenty dollar bills are deposited ruefully into his palm, and he fists them with a grin before shoving them into his pocket. 

"I really thought they wouldn't be able to wait," Bruce admits with a frown, staring mournfully into his orange juice. Natasha just looks sour. 

"What did I tell you," Clint says with a smirk. "She never _actually_ fucks people in the Seduction Room."


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve has seen some shit. Unfortunately (fortunately?), nothing could have prepared him for meeting Tony Stark.

Steve has always prided himself on being a level-headed individual. Through the Depression, the War, and everything that came after, he's always managed to keep his proverbial shit together, as Bucky might say. And, hypothetically speaking, nobody could wake up from a 70-year coma and cope decently unless they were already pretty good at handling anything life throws their way. 

That said, waking up from the ice with words on his arm really threw him for a loop. 

By the time he'd gone down in that plane at age twenty-seven, Steve had figured he wasn't gonna get words. He was an odd case, to be sure, but it wasn't like having no words at his age was completely unheard of: there were the urban legends, the fairy tale villains, and all kinds of religious discussions surrounding older folks with blank skin. Steve tried not to let the prejudice get to him. Matter of fact, most people weren't even born with them--in the 40s, age differences made the blank-to-written ratio for newborns about a sixty-forty split. 

Growing up, Steve's mother had always assured him that his words would show up someday. 

"It takes more time for some than for others, Steve," she'd told him the first time he'd asked, her laundry-chapped hands warm on his small shoulders. "Your soulmate's just...taking a little longer to get here, that's all."

Steve, still just a child, had believed her. In fact, he'd waited earnestly for his soulmate's arrival until his mother had passed away when he was sixteen. Weighed down by grief, the Depression, and his own steadily declining health, the future had looked incredibly bleak, and Steve had begun to doubt he was destined for love. The finishing blow was when he'd realized that even if the words eventually _did_ appear on his skin, the age difference between him and his soulmate was going to be _huge_. Even in the best case scenario, he would have had to wait for them for years. There was no way, no ending where things didn't turn out badly, no future where he didn't wind up lonely and pining for most of his life. 

So, at sixteen, he'd decided to stop being hung up on his destiny, and resolved to move on with his life while he still had one to live. 

In his darkest moments, especially before the serum, he'd thought that God didn't want him to have a soulmate. Soulmates needed each other--who'd _need_ to get stuck with skinny, asthmatic little Steve Rogers? He figured there wasn't much he could do for any dame, any _one_. He told Bucky so, once, when they were seventeen, drunk off their minds in an alley on some whiskey they'd stolen from a corner store down the block. 

"Don't gimme that, Steve," Bucky'd chided him, prying the whiskey from Steve's hand with a frown. "That ain't true and we both know it. Your soulmate's--"

"Dammit, Bucky; if they were gonna be born, they'd've done it already," Steve had said, cutting him off, slurring angrily at the spinning pavement with his head between his knees. "So just shut up, okay? Tell me again when I get some damn words on my body."

Then he'd vomited spectacularly all over his own shoes. 

" _Christ_ , Steve," Bucky had said some time later with a grimace, patting Steve's back as he emptied his stomach into a nearby sewer grate. "Look, if you--we're gonna find you someone, okay? We're gonna find you someone else who ain't got words. Hell, if anything, you've always got me. And, y'know, whatever kind of loser this ' _Nice arm, kid._ ' jackass on my thigh ends up being."

That had carried Steve for a while, too--right up until the war started, and Bucky, morally-driven and suicidal, enlisted. 

The enthusiastic attempts to introduce Steve to other wordless people drastically increased in number, after that. Girl after girl after guy came traipsing through their lives, and Steve wasn't stupid: it didn't take him long to figure out that the main reason Bucky was trying so hard to set him up was so he'd have somebody if Bucky himself ended up dying in the war. 

So he, headstrong, stubborn, and mad as hell, tried very, _very_ hard to prove to them both that he didn't need to be a shrinking violet, standing on the shore waving a damp handkerchief. The way he figured it, the Army was always happy to take on soldiers without words: less worry or heartbreak, if there wasn't someone waiting at home when the bad news came. 

And sure enough, to Erskine, his blank skin was just another item on an apparently long list of things that made him a good candidate for the serum. And, after the serum... well. 

Steve sure didn't feel like a shrinking violet anymore. 

Shaking off the glitter and glamour and getting out into the thick of things made him feel even better. Between his new abilities and his lack of personal connections, Steve was by far the best-qualified person to tackle the job of dismantling Hydra. While the war was gut-wrenching, and sobered him in ways he couldn't have ever expected, taking down such an awful, oppressive organization gave him a sense of purpose, made him feel like he was finally _doing_ something with his life. 

And when he met Peggy... well. It was a happy sort of coincidence that she also didn't have words. 

So, for a while, Steve was doing great. Of course, like all good things in his life, it didn't last. 

When Bucky died--when Steve's best friend and the only companion he'd ever had in life fell from that train, he--wasn't sure what he would do with himself. He no longer knew where he would go, after the war. How he would cope. 

He didn't know if he'd _ever_ cope.

So instead of thinking, Steve ignored the heaviness in his heart, ignored the cold, empty hole Bucky's loss had opened up in his chest the same way he'd ignored it when he'd lost his mother, and he'd done what he always did when tragedy happened during the war: he soldiered on. 

He soldiered on, and he finished his mission, took down the plane and all the bombs with it, and as the cold water burned on his skin and the salt in it seared through his nose and lungs, Steve closed his eyes. 

And for the first time in his life, he'd finally, _finally_ been at peace. 

Waking up in the 21st century is the opposite of peace. 

From the moment Steve stormed out of that carefully constructed hospital room, everything around him turned bright, loud, and dirty. New York was dirty in the forties, too, but here, in the _future_ , there's a weird chemical smell to the gutters and air that itches at his nose like a rash. It took him quite some time to adjust to the feeling of it, but eventually he finds he's growing used to the changes. 

Finding the ways the city hadn't changed helps a lot. Some of Steve's favorite stores are still open, and the streets are still in the same places, by and large, as when Steve knew them like the back of his hand. Brooklyn is hard to walk through, at first, but when Steve sees things like the corner store where he and Bucky had pried that bottle of whiskey from the shelf with sticky fingers--well, it all hurts a little less. 

But the strangest thing about waking up, without question, is discovering his skin his no longer blank. 

The words are in the most brazen, obvious spot: if Steve isn't wearing long sleeves, anyone on the street can see them, curling in an absurd number of loops around and around the center of his left bicep (the only thing that keeps him from throwing all the t-shirts SHIELD gave him in the dumpster is the fact that the handwriting is so slanted and loopy, it's nearly illegible). Steve knows that there's no scientific proof that the location of your words has anything to do with your other half's personality, but when he first sees the mark, all he can think is, _Well, someone's possessive._

The first time Steve actually notices it is after they get back to SHIELD's NYC HQ. It's a telling sign of how far he's distanced himself from the idea he could have a soulmate. In fact, when he initially catches a passing glimpse of it in the mirror of the tiny bathroom in his new quarters, Steve thinks it's a smudge of grime or dirt. When he gets closer and realizes what it is, his heart about stops, and he could swear his blood runs cold. 

Once the initial shock wears off, he has a hell of a time trying to read the damn thing. He spends several frustrating minutes lifting and lowering his arm, craning his neck awkwardly in front of the mirror and trying to decipher the messy scrawl now tattooed on his skin (and undoubtedly looks like a bonafide idiot for every single one of those minutes; Steve's certain that Bucky would be laughing his ass off, if he were here), but the annoyance and the extra effort his soulmark cause him don't seem to matter very much once he's finished reading it all: 

" _Oh dear sweet holy mother of God, that is a lot of blood; I wish I had a fucking towel or some shit instead of all this metal, Jesus--uhh, here, I'll just--put some pressure on this, this delicious thigh of yours--holy shit I need to shut up--_ "

Steve stands in front of the mirror for a long time. Just sits there, speechless, and stares at the words he can see without moving his arm. The absurd middle line _fucking towel or some shit_ stares back at him as his feet warm the tile, written on his skin in messy, loopy black. 

Eventually, though, his brain catches up to his pounding heart, and Steve lifts his right hand up to his mouth reflexively to stifle a bubble of disbelieving laughter. Eventually, the hysteria he feels fizzles and swells up beneath his skin to the point that he can't hold it back any longer, swaying on his feet in a way he hasn't since before the serum. Feeling dizzy, Steve clatters to his knees and braces himself over the bathroom sink. He buries his head in his forearms to muffle the sound, curling in upon himself, and laughs crazily into his own skin for what feels like hours, euphoria and disbelief warring with the fresh grief within him. Part of Steve feels feather-light, giddy with the revelation that _he is no longer alone_. 

It tears him up that the people he loves can't be here to see it, but... 

Whoever Steve's lost, whatever he left behind before he took the plunge and drove that plane down into the ice... somehow, he's gained a soulmate. 

It doesn't fix everything, and it certainly can't replace everything that he's lost, but...well. 

It does go a long way in warming him towards the future. 

Once the initial wave of emotion subsides and he's calmed down a bit, he splashes cold water over his face and heads back to the small desk in his room, where he writes his words out on paper for the first time. 

Once the initial rush of acclimatization and adaptation he experiences has diminished, Steve doesn't have much excitement in his life. Even New York City is only so big, and re-learning its streets doesn't take him longer than about the first month. Within the first week, he finds he's already memorized the words. 

The more Steve turns over the contents of the sentence itself in his mind (if the frantic run-on that encircles his arm can generously be _called_ a sentence), the more he finds it interesting. He's ruminating on it a few weeks after waking up, as he takes out his pent-up energy on a punching bag in the gym, when he realizes how lucky he is. Most people's marks aren't this long, nor are they so easily distinguished: he's known plenty of people with marks that said things like, "It's a pleasure to meet you," or "Sorry; pardon me." Steve's fortunate enough to _know_ when he meets his soulmate: there isn't a snowball's chance in hell someone else will say this particular combination of words to him first. The "Likewise," and "My pleasure," folks he once knew in the forties would have killed to be able to find their match with such certainty. 

Crazier still, he thinks as he pounds his fists into the faltering bag, Steve can already get a good idea of his mate, personality-wise. He isn't one of the rare people lucky enough to get a name in his mark, but even without that, the words themselves still offer him a lot of information. 

They'll meet in a battle situation, or at least Steve will be injured--more specifically, he'll have received a thigh wound. They'll have to be brave enough to get their hands dirty of what seems to be their own initiative, so they clearly have some character of character--and they'll have metal with them, so maybe he or she is a soldier? An engineer? Regardless of the specific details (and the fact that the way they speak is almost jarringly modern), one thing is very clear: Steve's soulmate, whoever he or she might be, is a real and unashamed firecracker. Beyond that, they're also considerate (or enough to care about his future bleeding leg wound), shameless, attracted to him to the point that it bleeds through the worry, and very clearly putting their foot straight into their mouth. 

Steve huffs a chuckle to the empty room and shakes the sweat off his brow. He can't _wait_ to meet them. 

A month and a half in, once the initial flood of grief has passed and the reality of the whole situation starts to set in, having something to focus on helps him cope. Steve finally works up the courage to contact Peggy, whose words apparently appeared mere days after he went down in the ice, and after they finish catching up, he confesses to her that he doesn't feel like he deserves this. 

After all...as far as Steve knows, Bucky never actually got to meet his soulmate. 

"Oh, Steve," Peggy's voice crackles over the phone as she sighs, changed by age but still so familiar. "You _know_ that wouldn't matter to him. Above anything else, he'd only ever want you to be happy." 

She's right, of course. As usual. 

So, with Peggy's words and the words on his arm bolstering him, Steve puts down the phone, picks himself up, and does what he does best: he soldiers on. 

In a fit of half grief-induced stupidity (or "bravery," as Bucky would call it) brought on by the call, he asks Director Fury about his words in a one-on-one meeting later that day. He doesn't bother pretending the Director doesn't know what they are: the man probably had them memorized days before Steve even woke up. Mostly, he's curious why SHIELD didn't inform him of his mark as soon as he awoke, why it wasn't used as a proverbial bargaining chip to get Steve to stay or still or calm down, or do any other myriad of things that the organization might find useful. 

The Director raises his one eyebrow. "Well, Captain," he begins, folding his fingers in front of him on his desk with the unaffected air of someone who already saw this question coming, "We thought that that particular change might be something you'd like to discover for yourself."

Fury's right. That isn't all there is to it, though, and Steve, with years of training in separating truths from half-truths, can tell. Politely, he probes further, even though the tightness around the man's good eye is telling him to leave it there. "You wouldn't happen to know who it is, would you, sir?"

Fury doesn't usually have many tells. The man is about as readable as a stone wall on a _good_ day--but when Steve poses that particular innocently-phrased question, the Director scowls openly and leans back in his chair, shaking his head. 

"I...have my suspicions," Fury says sourly, glowering at him across his desk. It sounds as though he very badly hopes that those suspicions are wrong. "Will that be all, Captain?"

Steve leaves Fury's office a little confused, and vaguely concerned. 

The concern later evaporates once he reaches the gym, and, pulling off his shirt, catches sight of the looping scrawl of his words in the locker room mirror. He smiles to himself and slings a towel over his shoulder, shaking his head at his own doubts. 

Fury doesn't have to like his soulmate, after all: only he does. 

 

By the time Steve's busy getting the snot beaten out of him by Loki a few months later, he has long since heard of Iron Man--or, perhaps more accurately, the Iron _Woman,_ Antonia Stark. The first he heard of her was in the briefing he'd received on his friends' post-war lives shortly after the thaw; he'd opened the file folder and there she was, smiling winningly amongst all the information about Howard. Other than the post-script that said she'd inherited her father's company, there wasn't much info about her in that packet; what there was was enough to tell Steve that she's smart, savvy, and still hasn't found her soulmate. The rest, he's heard by word of mouth, and learned from the file on the Avengers Initiative Fury handed him yesterday. 

Now, the things Steve knows about her begin scrolling through his head as she, along with Natasha, comes screaming down from the skies in her flashy, red and gold suit of futuristic armor, and cuts in between him and Loki. Steve takes the opportunity she gives him with her loud, distracting entrance to catch his breath, rolling up into a crouch as soon as the muscles in his wounded thigh stop protesting enough to make it viable. By the time he's got his feet under him again, the all-over ache in his body is already beginning to fade. 

She's handed off the situation and is on her way over to him before Steve can stand up. As she crosses the square, moving surprisingly quickly on the ground for someone wearing something so bulky, some smooth-looking joint in her armor works to retract her faceplate, revealing a very worried, very pretty woman. 

The suit whirs futuristically as she kneels down next to him, already talking a mile a minute: "Oh dear sweet holy mother of God, that is a _lot_ of blood; I wish I had a fucking towel or some shit instead of all this metal, Jesus--" Her attention is totally focused on the bleeding wound in his leg, which, to be fair, looks pretty bad if you don't know the serum, so she misses the way his eyebrows shoot straight into his hairline. 

Her face is grimy and her eyes are wild, and the messy hair the helmet has given her only adds to the slightly crazed look she's sporting as she babbles on. She looks like some futuristic, combat-ready version of Rosie the Riveter. Howard Stark's only daughter. 

She's Steve's soulmate, and she's absolutely _beautiful_. 

Her frantic chattering continues as he admires her silently, already aware of what her next words will be, and she's as bold, outspoken, and nervous as he anticipated she would be, looking at his words these past few months. She reaches out and presses her armor-covered hands almost hesitantly to his leg, glancing up at him nervously as if he might possibly object to having her hands on him. "Uhh, here, I'll just--put some pressure on this, this delicious thigh of yours--" she blurts, eyes darting to his with a spark of panic as she realizes what she's just said. "--holy shit I need to shut up--"

Steve, who's been working hard not to laugh at the picture she paints staring at him worriedly in her bullet-proof suit of advanced, weaponized armor, decides it's time to put her out of her misery. He rests his free hand on hers, and chooses his next words carefully. "Please do shut up, Miss Stark," he says gently, unable to keep some of his amusement from showing on his face. 

Antonia "Tony" Stark goes silent, her mouth falling open in surprise. Then--totally heedless of the chaos and violence going on around them--her expression almost instantly morphs from shocked to speculative, and, with zero hesitation and zero shamelessness, she leans back with a glimmer in her eyes and blatantly gives him a once-over. 

_This woman_. 

When Tony Stark, Iron Man, meets Steve's eyes again, all she says, with an air of false casualness, is: "Once this is wrapped up, I'm gonna suck your dick."

It's so unexpected, Steve forgets how to breathe for a second and chokes on his own saliva. It takes him a moment to recover, but as soon as he does, he gives her a very deliberate look that he used to use on the girls in France, and replies, "Only if I get to return the favor."

Her grin is positively wicked. Steve helps her up, not once looking away from her face as she presses close to him through the armor, and thinks that she, the woman with whom he'll be spending the rest of his life, looks like the cat who caught the canary. 

"Oh, Steve," she nearly purrs, "I think this is the beginning of a _beautiful_ relationship."

Steve, as they part and stroll together towards the Quinjet, does not disagree.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Bucky meets his soulmate--or, near-immortality can leave you pretty emotionally stunted.

" _Fuck you, you jackass; I'm 97 goddamn years old_."

Logan had always thought it was convenient that his words explained how a nearly immortal guy would feasibly meet his soulmate.

It also meant that when his words popped up in the 1910s, he was pretty pissed off at the whole goddamn universe.

97? His soulmate was gonna be on their fucking deathbed by the time he got in touch with them, and Logan himself was gonna have to wait decades before anything happened. He stalks around, fucks around in wars while Victor mocks him relentlessly (the jackass), and tells himself he doesn't care how his soulmate's growing up--he's not gonna meet them for years to come, anyway. His words are a damn timer, counting down to what everyone says oughta be the most beautiful moment of his life.

What a pile of bullshit.

After Stryker shoots him in the goddamn head--well.

His memories, after all that, aren't exactly A+. He forgets when his words first showed up, so for a while, he avoids anything that has to do with old people.

After Charles helps him get the words back, he stops keeping track of hospitals and nursing homes.

He scowls through the next New Year, because this is the year he's finally gonna meet his stupid nonagenarian jerk soulmate. Great. He's sure they'll enjoy their assuredly limited time together.

"Oh, come on, Logan," Marie scolds him while they wait for the ball to drop. "They could be a mutant, too; you don't know for sure. Meeting your soulmate is exciting!" She's trying to be helpful or something, but the pink, glittery HAPPY NEW YEAR tiara she's wearing ruins any chance of him taking her seriously.

So instead he stares at her flatly. "Thanks, princess, but there's a far better likelihood I'll be spending the next few years wiping someone else's wrinkly ass."

Next to her, Bobby makes a face through his oversized disco glasses. "Ugh, gross; didn't need that mental image."

"You're welcome," Logan says curtly. He unfolds himself from the couch and stalks out of the room. It'll just be more of the same shit if he sticks around; he can just see Kitty and Kurt independently gearing up to give him painfully earnest pep talks.

Instead, he spends the rest of the night in his room with a tumbler of whiskey until the irritation buzzing around in his head like a fly dims enough that he can sleep.

After he violently shuts down all the other intrusive assholes who bring it up over the next couple days, everyone learns to leave it the fuck alone. It bugs the shit out of him that _they all know_ , but he can tolerate that as long as they don't talk about it.

He nearly rips Scott's throat out in the spring during a training sim when the asshole makes a fucking joke about his mark (which is on his knuckles; goddamn piece of shit soulmate), so when the Avengers put out an SOS for help in NYC the next day, he's sent off with six or seven others to help. Apparently Charles thinks a change of scenery will be good for him.

"For a man's man, Logan, you can be awfully sensitive," Ororo says drily on the jet ride there. Peter snickers. Logan just snarls.

Predictably, by the time they get to New York, it's all gone to shit. Some kind of new alien robots are absolutely wrecking the city, as per a normal Avengers Tuesday, but there's a fuckton of them and damn if the Avengers don't need some help. Poor bastards.

With all the bogeys in the sky, Hank doesn't even bother landing the jet; instead, he opens the back as they fly by and, taking the cue, everyone pitches themselves out into the open air.

Logan lands right on one of the tin cans' backs and begins ripping it to fucking pieces. He's gotta hand it to Charles: some good old fashioned destruction is exactly what he needed.

The other X-Men are already in the fray. Thunder booms, and out of the corner of his eye, he sees Peter rip a bot in half before he and Kurt vanish in a cloud of smoke.

He jumps to another robot when the first begins to plummet, and is busy slashing into its chest cavity when the fucker spins out and plows them both into the side of a building. The explosion throws him down onto the street, and he lands with a grunt, shaking off soot and gritting his teeth as the burn wounds heal. Goddamn robots--at least the Sentinals didn't blow up, for chrissakes.

There's more action down here on the streets: he can just see Captain America's shield blur past before the man himself catches it, way down the block nearly out of Logan's sightline. Iron Man shrieks past several stories above, twisting to evade the missile fire the bots are laying on him. A distant explosion, followed by an angry bellow, gives away the position of the Hulk. It's an impressive shitshow.

He's barely gotten up from the pavement when another robot lays it on him from behind, punting him into a nearby car before he can react. Logan wedges himself out of it and snarls, slices off the thing's arm when it swings for him again.

He's rearing back to plant his claws right in the center of its chest when a metal hand reaches up from behind and tears off its head.

He stiffens as the headless body drops, neck sparking violently, to reveal a young guy in all black with the head clutched in his all-metal arm.

Before he can say anything, the kid tosses the hunk of metal about a hundred feet straight up in the air, and Iron Man, who's looping back around, catches it on his way past.

That head had to be at least fifty pounds. He glances at the stranger's metal arm with a raised brow and says, "Nice arm, kid."

The guy's already angry scowl gets even angrier, if possible, and he rips off the mask covering his mouth before snarling, "Fuck you, you jackass; I'm 97 goddamn years old."

Logan's eyebrows shoot up. This kid--he glances at the arm again--he's, what, the Winter Soldier? He looks again at his soot-smudged brow and fairly impressive pout. Look at those baby blues. Logan's doomed.

And he leans back and gives a full-bellied laugh, eyes clenching shut at the irony of the situation as something explodes in Captain America's direction.

"Ah, god; Marie was right," he says when he finally gets a hold of himself, grinning as he looks at his soulmate's bemused expression. "Logan Howlett. Let's catch up later."

His soulmate frowns, then perks up, touching the communicator in his ear, before all the robots shut down abruptly and drop to the ground like flies. Logan is grudgingly impressed.

"Bucky Barnes," his soulmate says, looking at him speculatively. "Let's catch up _now_."

They end up on a rooftop somewhere, Logan waiting for Ororo to finish her debrief with the Avengers, and his soulmate--Bucky--assuring him that he's clear to wander off.

"So, lemme get this straight," Bucky says slowly, staring at him with a thoughtful expression, "you're--150 years old?"

"Just over that, yeah," Logan confirms, idly admiring the way Bucky's hair curls at the nape of his neck. The guy's got a nice jaw; Logan can't wait for the beard burn that stubble's going to give him.

Bucky runs his hands over his mouth and looks out over the cityscape, contemplating. "Well," he says eventually, "I guess that makes some sense, considering we're supposed to be soulmates."

Logan barks a laugh. "Believe me, when your words showed up in 1917, I was pretty pissed off." He offers Bucky his knuckles, and his soulmate reaches out with his flesh hand like he can't even stop himself, breath hitching as he traces his chicken scratch writing on Logan's body. "Made me think I was gonna wait almost a century just to have you die right after."

Bucky's eyes crinkle at that, a little smirk forming on his lips. "Yeah, well, I could always tell you were a real bastard."

Logan snorts. "Why's that?"

"'Cause I thought my mark was about baseball, and I was shit at it," Bucky replies without taking his hand from Logan's. Logan huffs and shakes his head.

"Yeah, well, you weren't wrong. I was talking about your throw, not the metal," he admits, reaching out with his free hand to touch the metal of Bucky's arm, frowning when his soulmate flinches back before deliberately relaxing.

"Hey," Logan says quietly, drawing back, "don't worry about any of that. I've been shot through the head and lived, Buck; you can't hurt me. Besides," he adds, pushing his claws out of his free hand, the metal glinting in the sunlight, "you think I was born with these?"

Bucky smiles tiredly, but--he's also relaxed, some. Logan's getting through to him. And he knows what it means, too, to meet someone who's gone through the same kind of pain you have; he doesn't think it's a coincidence that the two of them have only met after going through all their separate shit.

"So," Bucky says later, the two of them watching as Hank maneuvers gracefully around to land on a roof adjacent to theirs, "when are you moving to Brooklyn?"

Logan just laughs.


End file.
